The Dosadi Experiment (ConSentiency Universe #2)

The Dosadi Experiment (ConSentiency Universe #2) Page 35

Choose containable violence when violence cannot be avoided.  Better this than epidemic violence.

- Lessons of Choice, The BuSab Manual

The senior attendant of the Courtarena, a squat and dignified Gowachin of the Assumptive Phylum, confronted McKie at the arena door with a confession:

"I have delayed informing you that some of your witnesses have been excluded by Prosecution challenge."

The attendant, whose name was Darak, gave a Gowachin shrug, waited.

McKie glanced beyond the attendant at the truncated oval of the arena entrance which framed a lower section of the audience seats.  The seats were filled.  He had expected some such challenge for this first morning session of the trial, saw Darak's words as a vital revelation.  They were accepting his gambit.  Darak had signaled a risky line of attack by those who guided Ceylang's performance.  They expected McKie to protest.  He glanced back at Aritch, who stood quietly submissive three steps behind his Legum.  Aritch gave every appearance of having resigned himself to the arena's conditions.

"The forms must be obeyed."

Beneath that appearance lay the hoary traditions of Gowachin Law - The guilty are innocent.  Governments always do evil.  Legalists put their own interests first.  Defense and prosecution are brother and sister.  Suspect everything.

Aritch's Legum controlled the initial posture and McKie had chosen defense.  It hadn't surprised him to be told that Ceylang would prosecute.  McKie had countered by insisting that Broey sit on a judicial panel which would be limited to three members.  This had caused a delay during which Bildoon had called McKie, probing for any betrayal.  Bildoon's approach had been so obvious that McKie had at first suspected a feint within a feint.

"McKie, the Gowachin fear that you have a Caleban at your command.  That's a force which they . . ."

"The more they fear the better."

McKie had stared back at the screen-framed face of Bildoon, observing the signs of strain.  Jedrik was right:  the non-Dosadi were very easy to read.

"But I'm told you left this Dosadi in spite of a Caleban contract which prohibited . . ."

"Let them worry.  Good for them."

McKie watched Bildoon intently without betraying a single emotion.  No doubt there were others monitoring this exchange.  Let them begin to see what they faced.  Puppet Bildoon was not about to uncover what those shadowy forces wanted.  They had Bildoon here on Tandaloor, though, and this told McKie an essential fact.  The PanSpechi chief of BuSab was being offered as bait.  This was precisely the response McKie sought.

Bildoon had ended the call without achieving his purpose.  McKie had nibbled only enough to insure that Bildoon would be offered again as bait.  And the puppet masters still feared that McKie had a Caleban at his beck and call.

No doubt the puppet masters had tried to question their God Wall Caleban.  McKie hid a smile, thinking how that conversation must have gone.  The Caleban had only to quote the letter of the contract, and if the questioners became accusatory the Caleban would respond with anger, ending the exchange.  And the Caleban's words would be so filled with terms subject to ambiguous translation that the puppet masters would never be certain of what they heard.

As he stared at the patiently waiting Darak, McKie saw that they had a problem, those shadowy figures behind Aritch.  Laupuk had removed Mrreg from their councils and his advice would have been valuable now.  McKie had deduced that the correct reference was "The Mrreg" and that Aritch headed the list of possible successors.  Aritch might be Dosadi-trained but he was not Dosadi-born.  There was a lesson in this that the entire ConSentiency would soon learn.

And Broey as a judge in this case remained an unchangeable fact.  Broey was Dosadi-born.  The Caleban contract had kept Broey on his poison planet, but it had not limited him to a Gowachin body.  Broey knew what it was to be both Human and Gowachin.  Broey knew about the Pcharkys and their use by those who'd held Dosadi in bondage.  And Broey was now Gowachin.  The forces opposing McKie dared not name another Gowachin judge.  They must choose from the other species.  They had an interesting quandary.  And without a Caleban assistant, there were no more Pcharkys to be had on Dosadi.  The most valuable coin the puppet masters had to offer was lost to them.  They'd be desperate.  Some of the older ones would be very desperate.

Footsteps sounded around the turn of the corridor behind Aritch.  McKie glanced back, saw Ceylang come into view with her attendants.  McKie counted no less than twenty leading Legums around her.  They were out in force.  Not only Gowachin pride and integrity, but their sacred view of Law stood at issue.  And the desperate ones stood behind them, goading.  McKie could almost see those shadowy figures in the shape of this entourage.

Ceylang, he saw, wore the black robes and white-striped hood of Legum Prosecutor, but she'd thrown back the hood to free her mandibles.  McKie detected tension in her movements.  She gave no sign of recognition, but McKie saw her through Dosadi eyes.

I frighten her.  And she's right.

Turning to address the waiting attendant and speaking loudly to make sure that the approaching group heard, McKie said:

"Every law must be tested.  I accept that you have given me formal announcement of a limit on my defense."

Darak, expecting outraged protest and a demand for a list of the excluded witnesses, showed obvious confusion.

"Formal announcement?"

Ceylang and entourage came to a stop behind Aritch.

McKie went on in the same loud voice:

"We stand here within the sphere of the Courtarena.  All matters concerning a dispute in the arena are formal in this place."

The attendant glanced at Ceylang, seeking help.  This response threatened him.  Darak, hoping someday to be a High Magister, should now be recognizing his inadequacies.  He would never make it in the politics of the Gowachin Phyla, especially not in the coming Dosadi age.

McKie explained as though to a neophyte:

"Information to be verified by my witnesses is known to me in its entirety.  I will present the evidence myself."

Ceylang, having stooped to hear a low-voiced comment from one of her Gowachin advisors, showed surprise at this.  She raised one of her ropey tendrils, called, "I protest.  The Defense Legum cannot give . . ."

"How can you protest?" McKie interrupted.  "We stand here before no judicial panel empowered to rule on any protest."

"I make formal protest!" Ceylang insisted, ignoring an advisor on her right who was tugging at her sleeve.

McKie permitted himself a cold smile.

"Very well.  Then we must call Darak into the arena as witness, he being the only party present who is outside our dispute."

The edges of Aritch's jaws came down in a Gowachin grimace.

"At the end, I warned them not to go with the Wreave," he said.  "They cannot say they came here unwarned."

Too late, Ceylang saw what had happened.  McKie would be able to question Darak on the challenges to the witnesses.  Some of those challenges were certain to be overturned.  At the very least, McKie would know who the Prosecution feared.  He would know it in time to act upon it.  There would be no delays valuable to Prosecution.  Tension, fear, and pride had made Ceylang act precipitately.  Aritch had been right to warn them, but they counted on McKie's fear of the interlocked Wreave triads.  Let them count.  Let them blunt their awareness on that and on a useless concern over the excluded witnesses.

McKie motioned Darak through the doorway into the arena, heard him utter an oath.  The reason became apparent as McKie pressed through in the crowded surge of the Prosecutor's party.  The instruments of Truth-by-Pain had been arrayed on their ancient rack below the judges.  Seldom brought out of their wrappings even for display to visiting dignitaries these days, the instruments had not been employed in the arena within the memory of a living witness.  McKie had expected this display.  It was obvious that Darak and Ceylang had not.  It was interesting to note the members of Ceylang's entourage who were watching for McKie's response.

He gave them a grin of satisfaction.

McKie turned his attention to the judicial panel.  They had given him Broey.  The ConSentiency, acting through BuSab, held the right of one appointment.  Their choice delighted McKie.  Bait, indeed!  Bildoon occupied the seat on Broey's right.  The PanSpechi chief of bureau sat there all bland and reserved in his unfamiliar Gowachin robes of water green.  Bildoon's faceted eyes glittered in the harsh arena lighting.  The third judge had to be the Gowachin choice and undoubtedly maneuvered (as Bildoon had been) by the puppet masters.  It was a Human and McKie, recognizing him, missed a step, recovered his balance with a visible effort.

What were they doing?

The third judge was named Mordes Parando, a noted challenger of BuSab actions.  He wanted BuSab eliminated - either outright or by removing some of the bureau's key powers.  He came from the planet Lirat, which provided McKie with no surprises.  Lirat was a natural cover for the shadowy forces.  It was a place of enormous wealth and great private estates guarded by their own security forces.  Parando was a man of somewhat superficial manners which might conceal a genuine sophisticate, knowledgeable and erudite, or a completely ruthless autocrat of Broey's stamp.  He was certainly Dosadi-trained.  And his features bore the look of the Dosadi Rim.

There was one more fact about Parando which no one outside Lirat was supposed to know.  McKie had come upon it quite by chance while investigating a Palenki who'd been an estate guard on Lirat.  The turtlelike Palenki were notoriously dull, employed chiefly as muscle.  This one had been uncommonly observant.

"Parando makes advice on Gowachin Law."

This had been responsive to a question about Parando's relationship with the estate guard being investigated.  McKie, not seeing a connection between question and answer, had not pursued the matter, but had tucked this datum away for future investigation.  He had been mildly interested at the time because of the rumored existence of a legalist enclave on Lirat and such enclaves had been known to test the limits of legality.

The people behind Aritch would expect McKie to recognize Parando.  Would they expect Parando to be recognized as a legalist?  They were certain to know the danger of putting Parando on a Gowachin bench.  Professional legalists were absolutely prohibited from Gowachin judicial service.

"Let the people judge."

Why would they need a legalist here?  Or were they expecting McKie to recognize the Rim origins of Parando's body?  Were they warning McKie not to raise that issue here?  Body exchange and the implications of immortality represented a box of snakes no one wanted to open.  And the possibility of one species spying on another. . .  There was fragmentation of the ConSentiency latent in this case.  More ways than one.

If I challenge Parando, his replacement may be more dangerous.  If I expose him as a legalist after the trial starts . . .  Could they expect me to do that?  Let us explore it.

Knowing he was watched by countless eyes, McKie swept his gaze around the arena.  Above the soft green absorbent oval where he stood were rank on rank of benches, every seat occupied.  Muted morning light from the domed translucent ceiling illuminated rows of Humans, Gowachin, Palenki, Sobarips . . .  McKie identified a cluster of ferret Wreaves just above the arena, limber thin with a sinuous flexing in every movement.  They would bear watching.  But every species and faction in the ConSentiency would be represented here.  Those who could not come in person would watch these proceedings via the glittering transmitter eyes which looked down from the ceiling's edges.

Now, McKie looked to the right at the witness pen set into the wall beneath the ranked benches.  He identified every witness he'd called, even the challenged ones.  The forms were being obeyed.  While the ConSentient Covenant required certain modifications here, this arena was still dominated by Gowachin Law.  To accent that, the blue metal box from the Running Phylum occupied the honor place on the bench in front of the judicial panel.

Who will taste the knife here?

Protocol demanded that Prosecutor and Defense approach to a point beneath the judges, abase themselves, and call out acceptance of the arena's conditions.  The Prosecutor's party, however, was in disarray.  Two of Ceylang's advisors were whispering excited advice to her.

The members of the Judicial panel conferred, glancing at the scene below them.  They could not act formally until the obeisance.

McKie passed a glance across the panel, absorbed Broey's posture.  The Dosadi Gowachin's enlightened greed was like an anchor point.  It was like Gowachin Law, changeable only on the surface.  And Broey was but the tip of the Dosadi advisory group which Jedrik had approved.

Holding his arms extended to the sides, McKie marched forward, abased himself face down on the floor, stood and called out:

"I accept this arena as my friend.  The conditions here are my conditions but Prosecution has defiled the sacred traditions of this place.  Does the court give me leave to slay her outright?"

There was an exclamation behind him, the sound of running, the sudden flopping of a body onto the arena's matted floor.  Ceylang could not address the court before this obeisance and she knew it.  She and the others now also knew something else just as important - that McKie was ready to slay her despite the threat of Wreave vendetta.

In a breathless voice, Ceylang called out her acceptance of the arena's conditions, then:

"I protest this trick by Defense Legum!"

McKie saw the stirring of Gowachin in the audience.  A trick?  Didn't Ceylang know yet how the Gowachin dearly loved legal tricks?

The members of the judicial panel had been thoroughly briefed on the surface demands of the Gowachin forms, though it was doubtful that Bildoon understood sufficiently what went on beneath those forms.  The PanSpechi confirmed this now by leaning forward to speak.

"Why does the senior attendant of this court enter ahead of the Legums?"

McKie detected a fleeting smile on Broey's face, glanced back to see Darak standing apart from the prosecution throng, alone and trembling.

McKie took one step forward.

"Will the court direct Darak to the witness pen?  He is here because of a formal demand by the Prosecutor."

"This is the senior attendant of your court," Ceylang argued.  "He guards the door to . . ."

"Prosecution made formal protest to a matter which occurred in the presence of this attendant," McKie said.  "As an attendant, Darak stands outside the conflicting interests.  He is the only reliable witness."

Broey stirred, looked at Ceylang, and McKie realized how strange the Wreave must appear to a Dosadi.  This did not deter Broey, however.

"Did you protest?"

It was a direct question from the bench.  Ceylang was required to answer.  She looked to Bildoon for help but he remained silent.  Parando also refused to help her.  She glanced at Darak.  The terrified attendant could not take his attention from the instruments of pain.  Perhaps he knew something specific about their presence in the arena.

Ceylang tried to explain.

"When Defense Legum suggested an illegal . . ."

"Did you protest?"

"But the . . ."

"This court decides on all matters of legality.  Did you protest?"

"I did."

It was forced out of her.  A fit of trembling passed over the slender Wreave form.

Broey waved Darak to the witness pen, had to add a vocal order when the frightened attendant failed to understand.  Darak almost ran to the shelter of the pen.

Silence pervaded the arena.  The silence of the audience was an explosive thing.  They sat poised in the watching ovals, all of those species and factions with their special fears.  By now, they'd heard many stories and rumors.  Jumpdoors had spread the Dosadi emigres all across the ConSentiency.  Media representatives had been excluded from Dosadi and this court on the Gowachin argument that they were "prey to uninformed subjective reactions," but they would be watching here through the transmitter eyes at the ceiling.

McKie looked around at nothing in particular but taking in every detail.  There were more than three judges in this arena and Ceylang certainly must realize that.  Gowachin Law turned upon itself, existing "only to be changed."  But that watching multitude was quite another matter.  Ceylang must be made to understand that she was a sacrifice of the arena.  ConSentient opinion stood over her like a heavy sledge ready to smash down.

It was Parando's turn.

"Will opposing Legums make their opening arguments now?"

"We can't proceed while a formal protest is undecided," McKie said.

Parando understood.  He glanced at the audience, at the ceiling.  His actions were a direct signal:  Parando knew which judges really decided here.  To emphasise it, he ran a hand from the front of his neck down his chest, the unique Rim Raider's salute from Dosadi signifying "Death before surrender."  Subtle hints in the movement gave McKie another datum:  Parando was a Gowachin in a Human body.  They'd dared put two Gowachin on that panel!

With Dosadi insight, McKie saw why they did this.  They were prepared to produce the Caleban contract here.  They were telling McKie that they would expose the body-exchange secret if he forced them to it.  All would see that loophole in the Caleban contract which confined the Dosadi-born, but released outsiders in Dosadi flesh.

They think I'm really Jedrik in this flesh!

Parando revealed even more.  His people intended to find the Jedrik body and kill it, leaving this McKie flesh forever in doubt.  He could protest his McKie identity all he wanted.  They had but to demand that he prove it.  Without the other person . . .  What had their God Wall Caleban told them?

"He is McKie, she is McKie.  He is Jedrik, she is Jedrik."

His mind in turmoil, McKie wondered if he dared risk an immediate mind contact with Jedrik.  Together, they'd already recognized this danger.  Jedrik had hidden herself on McKie's hideaway, a floating island on Tutalsee.  She was there with a special Taprisiot contract prohibiting unwanted calls which might inadvertently reveal her location.

The judges, led by Parando, were acting, however, moving for an immediate examination of Darak.  McKie forced himself to perform as a Legum.

His career in ruins, the attendant answered like an automaton.  In the end, McKie restored most of his witnesses.  There were two notable exceptions:  Grinik (that flawed thread which might have led to The Mrreg) and Stiggy.  McKie was not certain why they wanted to exclude the Dosadi weapons genius who'd transformed a BuSab wallet's contents into instruments of victory.  Was it that Stiggy had broken an unbreakable code?  That made sense only if Prosecution intended to play down the inherent Dosadi superiority.Still uncertain, McKie prepared to retire and seek a way to avoid Parando's gambit, but Ceylang addressed the bench.

"The issue of witnesses having been introduced by Defense," she said, "Prosecution wishes to explore this issue.  We note many witnesses from Dosadi called by Defense.  There is a noteworthy omission whose name has not yet been introduced here.  I refer to a Human by the name of Jedrik.  Prosecution wishes to call Keila Jedrik as . . ."

"One moment!"

McKie searched his mind for the forms of an acceptable escape.  He knew that his blurted protest had revealed more than he wanted.  But they were moving faster than he'd expected.  Prosecution did not really want Jedrik as a witness, not in a Gowachin Courtarena where the roles were never quite what they appeared to non-Gowachin.  This was a plain message to McKie.

"We're going to find her and kill her."

With Bildoon and Parando concurring, a jumpdoor was summoned and Ceylang played her trump.

"Defense knows the whereabouts of witness Keila Jedrik."

They were forcing the question, aware of the emotional bond between McKie and Jedrik.  He had a choice:  argue that a personal relationship with the witness excluded her.  But Prosecution and all the judges had to concur.  They obviously would not do this - not yet.  A harsh lock on his emotions, McKie gave the jumpdoor instructions.

Presently, Jedrik stepped onto the arena floor, faced the judges.  She'd been into the wardrobe at his bower cottage and wore a yellow and orange sarong which emphasized her height and grace.  Open brown sandals protected her feet.  There was a flame red blossom at her left ear.  She managed to look exotic and fragile.

Broey spoke for the judges.

"Do you have knowledge of the issues at trial here?"

"What issues are at trial?"

She asked it with a childlike innocence which did not even fool Bildoon.  They were forced to explain, however, because of those other judges to whom every nuance here was vital.  She heard them out in silence.

"An alleged experiment on a sentient population confined to a planet called Dosadi . . . lack of informed consent by subject population charged . . . accusations of conspiracy against certain Gowachin and others not yet named . . ."

Two fingers pressed to his eyes in the guise of intense listening, McKie made contact with Jedrik, suggesting, conferring.  They had to find a way out of this trap!  When he looked up, he saw the suspicions in Parando's face:  Which body, which ego?  McKie?  Jedrik?

In the end, Ceylang hammered home the private message, demanding whether Jedrik had "any personal relationship with Defense Legum?"

Jedrik answered in a decidedly un-Dosadi fashion.

"Why . . . yes.  We are lovers."

In itself, this was not enough to exclude her from the arena unless Prosecution and the entire judicial panel agreed.  Ceylang proposed the exclusion.  Bildoon and Parando were predictable in their agreement.  McKie waited for Broey.

"Agreed."

Broey had a private compact with the shadow forces then.  Jedrik and McKie had expected this, but had not anticipated the form confirmation would take.

McKie asked for a recess until the following morning.

With the most benign face on it, this was granted.  Broey announced the decision, smiling down at Jedrik.  It was a measure of McKie's Dosadi conditioning that he could not find it in himself to blame Broey for wanting personal victory over the person who had beaten him on Dosadi.

Back in his quarters, Jedrik put a hand on McKie's chest, spoke with eyes lowered.

"Don't blame yourself, McKie.  This was inevitable.  Those judges, none of them, would've allowed any protest from you before seeing me in person on that arena floor."

"I know."

She looked up at him, smiling.

"Yes . . . of course.  How like one person we are."

For a time after that, they reviewed the assessment of the aides chosen for Broey.  Shared memories etched away at minutiae.  Could any choice be improved?  Not one person was changed - Human or Gowachin.  All of those advisors and aides were Dosadi-born.  They could be depended upon to be loyal to their origins, to their conditioning, to themselves individually.  For the task assigned to them, they were the best available.

McKie brought it to a close.

"I can't leave the immediate area of the arena until the trial's over."

She knew that, but it needed saying.

There was a small cell adjoining his office, a bedog there, communications instruments, Human toilet facilities.  They delayed going into the bedroom, turned to a low-key argument over the advisability of a body exchange.  It was procrastination on both sides, outcome known in advance.  Familiar flesh was familiar flesh, less distracting.  It gave each of them an edge which they dared not sacrifice.  McKie could play Jedrik and Jedrik could play McKie, but that would be dangerous play now.

When they retired, it was to make love, the most tender experience either had known.  There was no submission, only a giving, sharing, an open exchange which tightened McKie's throat with joy and fear, sent Jedrik into a fit of un-Dosadi sobbing.

When she'd recovered, she turned to him on the bed, touched his right cheek with a finger.

"McKie."

"Yes?"

"I've never had to say this to another person, but . . ."  She silenced his attempted interruption by punching his shoulder, leaning up on an elbow to look down at him.  It reminded McKie of their first night together, and he saw that she had gone back into her Dosadi shell . . . but there was something else, a difference in the eyes.

"What is it?"

"Just that I love you.  It's a very interesting feeling, especially when you can admit it openly.  How odd."

"Stay here with me."

"We both know I can't.  There's no safe place here for either of us, but the one who . . ."

"Then let's . . ."

"We've already decided against an exchange."

"Where will you go?"

"Best you don't know."

"If . . ."

"No! I wouldn't be safe as a witness; I'm not even safe at your side.  We both . . ."

"Don't go back to Dosadi."

"Where is Dosadi?  It's the only place where I could ever feel at home, but Dosadi no longer exists."

"I meant . . ."

"I know."

She sat up, hugged her knees, revealing the sinewy muscles of her shoulders and back.  McKie studied her, trying to fathom what it was she hid in that Dosadi shell.  Despite the intimacy of their shared memories, something about her eluded him.  It was as though he didn't want to learn this thing.  She would flee and hide, of course, but . . .  He listened carefully as she began to speak in a faraway voice.

"It'd be interesting to go back to Dosadi someday.  The differences . . ."

She looked over her shoulder at him.

"There are those who fear we'll make over the ConSentiency in Dosadi's image.  We'll try, but the result won't be Dosadi.  We'll take what we judge to be valuable, but that'll change Dosadi more than it changes you.  Your masses are less alert, slower, less resourceful, but you're so numerous.  In the end, the ConSentiency will win, but it'll no longer be the ConSentiency.  I wonder what it'll be when . . ."

She laughed at her own musings, shook her head.

"And there's Broey.  They'll have to deal with Broey and the team we've given him.  Broey Plus!  Your ConSentiency hasn't the faintest grasp of what we've loosed among them."

"The predator in the flock."

"To Broey, your people are like the Rim - a natural resource."

"But he has no Pcharkys."

"Not yet."

"I doubt if the Calebans ever again will participate in . . ."

"There may be other ways. Look how easy it is for us."

"But we were printed upon each other by . . ."

"Exactly!  And they continue to suspect that you're in my body and I'm in yours.  Their entire experience precludes the free shift back and forth, one body to another . . ."

"Or this other thing . . ."

He caressed her mind.

"Yes!  Broey won't suspect until too late what's in store for him.  They'll be a long time learning there's no way to sort you from . . . me!"

This last was an exultant shout as she turned and fell upon him.  It was a wild replay of their first night together.  McKie abandoned himself together.  McKie abandoned himself to it.  There was no other choice, no time for the mind to dwell on depressing thoughts.

In the morning, he had to tap his implanted amplifiers to bring his awareness to the required pitch for the arena.  The process took a few minutes while he dressed.

Jedrik moved softly with her own preparations, straightened the bedog and caressed its resilient surface.  She summoned a jumpdoor then, held him with a lingering kiss.  The jumpdoor opened behind her as she pushed away from him.

McKie smelled familiar flowers, glimpsed the bowers of his Tutalsee island before the door blinked out of existence, hiding Jedrik and the island from him.  Tutalsee?  The moment of shocked understanding delayed him.  She'd counted on that!  He recovered, sent his mind leaping after her.

I'll force an exchange!  By the Gods . . .

His mind met pain, consuming, blinding pain.  It was agony such as he'd not even imagined could exist.

Jedrik!

His mind held an unconscious Jedrik whose awareness had fled from pain.  The contact was so delicate, like holding a newborn infant.  The slightest relaxation and he knew he would lose her to . . .  He felt that terrifying monster of the first exchange hovering in the background, but love and concern armed him against fear.

Frantic, McKie held that tenuous contact while he called a jumpdoor.  There was a small delay and when the door opened, he saw through the portal the black, twisted wreckage which had been his bower island.  A hot sun beat down on steaming cinders. And in the background, a warped metal object which might have been one of Tutalsee's little four-place flitters rolled over, gurgled, and sank.  The visible wreckage said the destructive force had been something like a pentrate, swift and all-consuming.  The water around the island still bubbled with it.  Even while he watched, the island began breaking up, its cinders drifting apart on the long, low waves.  A breeze flattened the steaming smoke.  Soon, there'd be nothing to show that beauty had floated here.  With a pentrate, there would be nothing to recover . . . not even bodies to . . .

He hesitated, still holding his fragile grasp on Jedrik's unconscious presence.  The pain was only a memory now.  Was it really Jedrik in his awareness, or only his remembered imprint of her?  He tried to awaken the sleeping presence, failed.  But small threads of memory emerged, and he saw that the destruction had been Jedrik's doing, response to attack.  The attackers had wanted a live hostage.  They hadn't anticipated that violent, unmistakable message.

"You won't hold me over McKie's head!"

But if there were no bodies . . .

Again, he tried to awaken that unconscious presence.  Her memories were there, but she remained dormant.  The effort strengthened his grip upon her presence, though.  And he told himself it had to be Jedrik, or he wouldn't know what had happened on the bower island.

Once more, he searched the empty water.  Nothing.  A pentrate would've torn and battered everything around it.  Shards of metal, flesh reduced to scattered cinders . . .

She's dead.  She has to be dead.  A pentrate . . .

But that familiar presence lay slumbering in his mind.

The door clacker interrupted his reverie.  McKie released the jumpdoor, turned to look through the bedside viewer at the scene outside his Legum quarters.  The expected deputation had arrived.  Confident, the puppet masters were moving even before confirmation of their Tutalsee gambit.  They could not possibly know yet what McKie knew.  There could be no jumpdoor or any other thread permitted to connect this group to Tutalsee.

McKie studied them carefully, keeping a bridle on his rage.  There were eight of them, so contained, so well schooled in Dosadi self-control.  So transparent to a Jedrik-amplified McKie.  They were four Humans and four Gowachin.  Overconfident.  Jedrik had seen to that by leaving no survivors.

Again, McKie tried to awaken that unconscious presence.  She would not respond.

Have I only built her out of my memories?

There was no time for such speculation.  Jedrik had made her choice on Tutalsee.  He had other choices to make here and now - for both of them.  That ghostly presence locked in his mind would have to wait.

McKie punched the communicator which linked him to Broey, gave the agreed-upon signal.

"It's time."

He composed himself then, went to the door.

They'd sent no underlings.  He gave them that.  But they addressed him as Jedrik, made the anticipated demands, gloated over the hold they had upon him.  It was only then that McKie saw fully how well Jedrik had measured these people; and how she had played upon her McKie in those last hours together like an exquisitely tuned instrument.  Now, he understood why she'd made that violent choice.

As anticipated, the members of the delegation were extremely surprised when Broey's people fell upon them without warning.